How did you learn to love yourself after a breakup?

[Riot21]

How did you learn to love yourself after a breakup? I broke up with my ex because I felt that I was not valued and our time together wasn't valued. My ex would see his family daily and consistently choose them over me even though we dated for seven years.

 

I was blamed for bringing up issues in the relationship and for not keeping the peace like he always did.

 

I was told I was crazy. I would be ignored. Lied to. Cheated on. Strung along. I never was given the luxury of having a planned date everything was a tentative plan and I was always told to be more flexible and not get so upset when plans fell through (and they usually did fall through).

 

After being told these negative things about me for years how does one rebuild confidence? How does one become happy again and not believe these things? I feel like my ex warped my sense of reality and sense of myself!

[Frostedflake]

Why would you let an ex tell you who you are? Why would you let someone who didn't care enough, didn't hold up their end of the relationship, didn't respect you- tell YOU who YOU are?

 

You don't have to be so all or nothing. You can say, "Dang. I actually was wrong that one time that they keep mentioning and holding over my head." Because we do screw up and make mistakes. But don't ever let an ex tell you who you are. (Particularly, when they didn't stick around to watch you come out better or stronger.)

 

Empty your head of any other voices or opinions in your life. Learn yourself again.

[Been]

With time you'll be OK as long as you keep NC with your ex.

[mousse]

It took me a long time to learn to love myself after a long series of break ups. But as 'Been' said, if you stay NC and stick with it, eventually, you heal, you start feeling better. It happens slowly but distancing yourself with the ex or people who hurt you does wonders. I feel healing from something like that is similar to healing from a physical ailment : you need to really take excellent care of yourself for a while. And as you take better care of yourself, get to know yourself more deeply, little by little, you get better and maybe also you start to fall in love with yourself. That's what happened to me after my last break up.

[Protec]

I am having hard time loving myself.

 

I have caused my 2 last breakups. And just 2 days ago i f'd up badly and my GF broke up with me. We had just started dating and i got too drunk and said awful things and acted like an idiot. Agressively yes.

 

I loved that woman. Unfortunately, i also have some mental health issues these days...and i just never learn. Alcohol is not for me.

 

I have lost so many people in my life because of alcohol...

[Jjun]

I think I am still in the process of learning but...

 

Over the past 3.5 years I've constantly been in relationships or had a guy in my life. I basically relied on them to make me feel happy and complete. Always jumping from one to another, too afraid to deal with my own emotions. My relationships weren't as negative as some, but they were still not healthy.

 

After my most recent breakup (about a month ago) I made a promise that I will work on myself and learn to be alone instead of running to the next guy for support. It's been really hard and the first few days of the break up I kept going back, but now after almost 4 weeks I can tell you I truly am starting to appreciate myself and love myself more than I probably have in the past 3 years.

 

At the end of the day I think it really comes down to your own will power and desire to change. I think you need to truly want to be happier and strive to make an effort to get there. Before I would constantly want to be happy with myself, but never put actual effort in and when it got scary or hard I would give up and run to the easy route. You have to make a conscious continuous effort to stop negative thinking, envision your future self you want to be, get out of bed and actually put the work in, etc.

 

The past few weeks I have felt immense pain, uncomfortableness, fear, and confusion. But I didn't let that push me to give up, instead I used it as fuel to get better.

 

Sorry I don't know if this answers your question, but hope it helps at least some.

[1fish2fish]

For me, this is what I've done/am doing, because it's a loooong process.

 

I made it a priority to invest in friendships with strong women who are good role models and have defined boundaries. They have positive attitudes and constantly build me up. I let other friendships that were draining and one sided fall to the wayside. You attract what you exude, and I've been taking that to heart. Now I've got a core group of amazing women that keep me centered and stable when I start waffling.

 

And then I focused on myself and stuff I enjoy doing. Biking, weightlifting, triathlons...and I made attainable goals for myself. Every time I meet a goal or challenge, I feel my self esteem bump up a notch.

I'm going out of my comfort zone which is scary but immensely rewarding, and I'm meeting incredible people along the way.

 

I've also put any thought of dating on the shelf for at least a year (until my Ironman triathlon is completed) so I can focus on me completely.

 

I know there is other stuff I'm doing, but I'm not fully awake. I just finished biking from LA to San Diego, and I'm a little whooped. lol

[preraph]

You have to love yourself whether you're in a relationship or not. A relationship can't make you whole. If you don't love yourself and then you depend on someone else for it, when they leave they take everything with them. Work on loving yourself no matter what.